Hi, I'm Michael.
This is Lessons from the Screenplay.
Over the last year, many people have asked me to analyze a movie with flaws.
One that doesn't quite hit the mark.
While there are certainly some easy targets, I thought it would be more valuable
to apply some constructive criticism to my favorite franchise of all time.
I love the Star Wars films.
They are the reason that from age two I knew I wanted to make movies.
And twenty-nine years later, the same holds true...
as The Force Awakens and Rogue One accounted for eight of my trips to the movie theater
in the last year and a half.
But while I think the newest entries show promise, they also have problems.
So today I want to examine some of these problems.
To analyze the importance of showing instead of telling.
To look at the difference between an active protagonist and a passive one.
And highlight the importance of a strong character arc and meaningful consequences.
Let's take a look at Rogue One and The Force Awakens.
A common piece of advice in screenwriting is "show, don't tell."
By comparing how Rogue One and The Force Awakens introduce their protagonists...
we can see why showing is more powerful than telling.
Let's start with Jyn.
In Rogue One, Jyn's character is first introduced when she's a little girl.
We see young Jyn witness her mother's murder as her father is forced to return to work
for the Empire.
We experience this event with her, so we have an understanding of who she was as a girl.
But we never get to see who she is.
When she wakes from this dream-memory, fifteen years have passed.
She's an adult now, a prisoner of the Empire.
But we don't know why.
We don't see the crimes she committed or any of the context surrounding them.
Instead we're told a list of her criminal charges.
Even as the list of her crimes is being read, she has no reaction.
We don't know if she's remorseful or has no regrets.
We don't even get the simple line from the teaser...
"This is a rebellion, isn't it?"
"I rebel."
...which at least hinted at a personality that enjoys resisting authority.
"Yes, sir."
And while hearing an emotional backstory can make us feel sympathy for a character...
"The last time I saw you, you gave me a knife and a loaded blaster and told me to wait in
a bunker till daylight."
...it doesn't make us empathize with them.
Compare this with how The Force Awakens dedicates six minutes—which is a lot of screen time—
to showing us Rey's life.
We watch her scavenging for parts in the hot sun, which she exchanges for small amounts
of food.
"What you brought me today is worth...one quarter portion."
As she cleans the parts, we see her gaze at an old woman performing the same job...
suggesting that Rey worries she'll end up the same way.
We see that she lives by herself,
and as she marks off another day it's clear she has been here a long time.
And finally we see her watch a shuttle leave the planet and head toward the stars...
as she puts on a pilot's helmet.
Rey dreams of flying away.
Being shown this sequence allows us to experience this with her...
which lets us understand her life much better than just being told about it.
But the power behind "show don't tell" isn't simply about visuals.
In his book "Screenplay," Syd Field writes:
"Action is character; a person is what he does, not what he says...
Because we're telling a story in pictures, we must show how the character acts and reacts...
to the incidents and events that he/she confronts and overcomes (or doesn't overcome)
during the story line."
By spending time with Rey, we get to see her make choices, which is critical to creating
an active protagonist.
Throughout the first half of The Force Awakens, Rey takes action and faces dilemmas that reveal
her true nature.
When she hears BB-8 being captured by a scavenger, she goes out of her way to free him.
"He has no respect for anyone."
Later, Unkar Plutt offers her sixty portions in exchange for BB-8.
Despite being tempted, she makes a difficult choice.
"Actually.
The droid's not for sale."
And when she learns that BB-8 is carrying a map to Luke Skywalker,
she chooses to leave her home behind and make sure BB-8 is delivered to the Resistance.
"He's going to get you home."
"We both will."
We understand Rey's values because she is an active protagonist for much of
The Force Awakens.
Jyn, on the other hand, is a passive protagonist.
In "Screenplay," Syd Field again writes...
"If you're writing your script and sense your characters are not as sharp or defined as
you think they should be...
the first thing you must determine is whether they're an active force in the screenplay—
whether they cause things to happen, or whether things happen to them."
For the majority of Rogue One, Jyn doesn't cause things to happen, things happen to Jyn.
She is rescued from the Imperial labor camp by the rebels...
taken to their headquarters on Yavin IV, and presented with a non-choice choice.
She can either do what they ask or go back to prison.
"We're up against the clock here, girl.
So if there's nothing to talk about we'll just put you back where we found you."
And what they're asking her to do is passive as well.
"What we need is someone who gets us through the door without being killed."
The rebels simply need her to be with them when they meet with Saw Gerrera, which is
not a very compelling task.
And the process of finding Saw is passive as well.
They wander around Jedha, only to get caught in a firefight...
caught by imperials, and then finally caught by Saw's rebels.
Her character's passivity prevents her from making meaningful choices
that reveal her true nature.
But this is not to imply that Rey is a perfect protagonist either.
In most stories the main character has some flaw or weakness that is preventing them from
being their best self.
Author K.M. Weiland describes this as,
"The lie your character believes."
In her book "Creating Character Arcs," Weiland writes...
“In order for your character to evolve in a positive way, he has to start out with something
lacking in his life,
some reason that makes the change necessary...
He is harboring some deeply held misconception about either himself, the world,
or probably both.”
The lie that Rey believes is established early on in The Force Awakens.
Rey naively believes the family that abandoned her on Jakku will return someday.
And her character arc is to accept the truth and overcome this weakness that is holding
her back.
But the problem is that this weakness doesn't really hold her back.
Most of the time it simply takes the form of her telling people
she has to get back to Jakku.
"But I have to get home."
"Where, Jakku?"
"I've already been away too long."
The only meaningful consequence of Rey believing this lie comes after she has the force vision
and encounters Maz Kenata.
"You already know the truth."
"Whomever you're waiting for on Jakku..."
"They're never coming back."
Rey refuses this new path and runs away,
which eventually leads her to be captured by Kylo Ren.
But soon after, her force powers grow and she's able to escape and ultimately overpower Kylo Ren.
The lie that Rey believes has very few consequences.
So overcoming it is not as powerful as could have been.
But consequences are not just helpful for defining character arcs.
The entire momentum of a film relies heavily on meaningful consequences.
I find that when I watch Rogue One, the second half is much more engaging
than the first half.
In the second half, the characters have a clear objective and the actions they take
move the plot forward.
But the first half of Rogue One is unnecessarily complicated
and filled with sequences that have little-to-no meaningful consequences for the plot.
For instance, Saw doesn't trust the Imperial pilot who carries the message from Jyn's father.
He subjects the pilot to a creature that causes its victims to lose their minds as it determines
their true intentions.
"Bor Gullet will know the truth."
But afterward, Saw Gerrera still doesn't believe the pilot...
"It's a trap, isn't it?"
"What?"
"The pilot!"
...who regains his mind the next time we see him.
"I brought the message, I'm the pilot."
This scene doesn't move the plot forward because it doesn't change anything.
There are no consequences.
The following trip to Eadu is similarly inconsequential.
Jyn has already seen the message revealing the Death Star's weakness.
She and we know the next step is to convince the Rebellion go to steal the plans.
But instead, they travel to Eadu, beginning a thirty-two minute sequence...
that has no lasting consequences and provides them with no new information.
It does function to let Jyn briefly reunite with her father.
But while the death of Jyn's father should be a significant moment for her and the story,
it ultimately doesn't change the trajectory of either.
Once Jyn has learned that Cassian had orders to assassinate her father...
"You lied to me."
...she's even angrier at him and the Rebellion than before.
CASSIAN: "I had every chance to pull the trigger, but did I?"
JYN: "You might as well have."
"Those were rebellion bombs that killed him."
This kind of revelation might give her cause her to abandon Cassian and forsake the rebellion.
But instead, in the following scenes she's giving a stirring speech to the rebels...
"Rebellions are built on hope."
...and teaming up with Cassian.
This strikes me as a rushed, outside-in approach to story design.
I feel this is a symptom of trying to give Jyn a personal connection to the Death Star
plans via her father figures...
without sufficient regard for logical character motivation and evolution.
While the first half of Rogue One has some structural problems,
once our characters take action to pursue a clear objective,
the film regains a sense of momentum.
"May the force be with us."
And here, I think, is where Rogue One really shines.
The premise is original in the Star Wars universe.
A team infiltrates an imperial base and sacrifices their lives for the Rebellion.
Although I feel the emotion of this sacrifice suffers from a lack of investment in the characters,
the ending is executed in a way that feels faithful to the original trilogy,
and hands off the baton to Episode IV in a fun and satisfying way.
A great example of what "A Star Wars Story" can be.
And while The Force Awakens may have bitten off a bit more than it could chew—
introducing new characters, continuing original trilogy storylines,
establishing a new planet killer weapon only to destroy it shortly after—
I feel it does do a fantastic job of making the audience invest in the protagonists.
We understand who they are, and see them work together to overcome obstacles...
and share emotional losses.
Making us eager to see what lays waiting for them in Episode VIII.
Overall, I love what Kathleen Kennedy and Lucasfilm have done with Star Wars so far.
I think they are taking interesting risks,
and I appreciate that they have so prominently featured female protagonists
and a diverse cast of characters.
And it's because I love Star Wars so much that I think it's good to be constructively
critical of the latest films.
We all want these new stories to be as good as possible, which means being honest about
what works and what doesn't.
While neither Rogue One nor The Force Awakens are perfect films,
I do feel they've breathed new life into the franchise and given the future of Star Wars
films a very welcome gift...
"Hope."
Hey guys, Michael here--
STORMTROOPER: There's one, blast them!
[scream]
Hope you enjoyed the video.
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